I'm working on a model that is based on a photo manipulation I did. It looks supper great and everything, but I want to be able to see it from many angles and change it at will, so I'm modelling it -- I'm not opposed to some photoshop afterward, but for the sake of ease and for the sake of learning, I'd like to get it as close to the picture as possible.

I'm having a bunch of trouble though -- it seems like everything I try, I hit a snag, so maybe someone would be so kind as to give me an overview of what I might do to reproduce this:

I have a loft to make the opening arches, but I couldn't figure out how to texture it so that the lines went along the length of it, instead of staying horizontal throughout the curve.

I have an idea of how to do the grass sides, which you can see in the test max file I've linked below, but it's not convincing: I can't seem to get the right amount of contrast in the blades, and I can't see to achieve that relatively hard shadow that nicely separates the layers.